I think FFXIII battle ATB was much quicker than FFXIV. I don't know how did you say that it is slower. I was playing it on JP ver, was there any different to your version? I remember they even allow "auto command" because it was too quick to select all default within time.

I think that copy FFXIII battle system is very good idea, but they need to remove "auto command" out, because we don't want all players to rely on auto mode. ^^;